State Trooper Balks At Plea Deal Proposal

Northampton County Judge Richard D. Grifo has taken under advisement a proposed negotiated guilty plea agreement for a Martins Creek man charged with 34 counts involving stolen vehicles and firearms.

Attilio DeBerardinis, 57, who owns Deber's Garage on Route 611 in the village, appeared before the judge with his attorney, Cregg Mayrosh, Assistant District Attorney Nicholas Englesson, and state trooper Richard Diskin, who is with the state police Anti-Fraud Unit.

Diskin was disturbed by the proposed plea arrangement, in which DeBerardinis has offered to plead guilty to two counts of receiving stolen property - a motor home and a .357 Smith and Wesson revolver.

In return for that plea, prosecutors would drop five other counts of receiving stolen property, plus seven counts of conspiracy to commit that crime, three counts each of six state regulations governing the proper identification of motor vehicles, and two counts of making false application for vehicle title registrations.

Diskin told the judge that DeBerardinis has offered no help to police in their investigation of how he acquired the stolen items. "We haven't been contacted by the district attorney or attorney Mayrosh," Diskin said.

Diskin's affidavit of probable cause for DeBerardinis's arrest notes that the suspects for the burglaries and thefts of the vehicles and firearms found at the garage were members of motorcycle gangs, including the Pagans and Warlocks.

Englesson, who stressed that he is not in charge of the case, but was simply filling in for Assistant District Attorney Daniel Spengler, who is trying another case this week, said that if DeBerardinis cooperates, "We would ask the court to take his cooperation into account."